


an honest heart as compass

by voksen



Category: Highlander - All Media Types, Les Misérables - All Media Types, Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Immortals, Kink Meme, Pining, Temporary Character Death, hamhanded classical references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-28
Updated: 2013-02-28
Packaged: 2017-12-03 22:05:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/703131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voksen/pseuds/voksen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Methos finds Grantaire dead in the Musain and leaves him, not quite so dead, in Jack's bar.</p><p>Prompt: "Grantaire, Jack Sparrow, and Methos walk into a bar."</p>
            </blockquote>





	an honest heart as compass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lanna Michaels (lannamichaels)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannamichaels/gifts).



Grantaire was no stranger to waking out of drunken, nightmare-infested stupors, but this one had been something else. He had - he had dreamed that he was Icarus, that he had touched the sun at last, he had dreamed that his wine had turned to blood and his blood to wine, and it had all spilled out over the doorstep of the Musain and flooded the streets like rain.

He would ask Joly what he had been drinking, he resolved, and then stay away from it for at least a week or two. With a groan, he rolled over, flopping onto his back like the dying fish he felt like, and pressed his hand over his still-closed eyes.

It was only then that he realized he did not have a headache.

He took his hand away again, brow creasing, and cautiously opened his eyes a crack, peering up at it. It was his hand; beyond it, a far-off splinter of sky. He was in an alley somewhere; this, in itself, was also not unusual. But really, aside from several twinging pangs in his chest and gut, he felt - almost good. Better than he usually did while sober, that was certain, although it didn't make him any more inclined to stay so.

Maybe Joly had forced some new medicine on him as a trial case, he thought, wrinkling his nose. If he'd been drunk enough to dream as he had, he might have been drunk enough to take him up on a fool thing like that. Well, no matter.

He sat up and realized with a start that he was not wearing his own clothes; that the coat he was wrapped in was more fit for the ragbin than Bossuet's, that his shirt was a distinctly different color, and that his pants and boots no longer quite fit. He might have been robbed while he was sleeping, to be sure - he checked the pockets of the new pants and found his purse missing, so that seemed likely - but who would rob a man of his clothes and then give him new?

A prank, then? But who? Puzzling at it, Grantaire levered himself to his feet - only to drop back to his knees, clutching his head as the headache he'd so far escaped struck him with a vengeance. His head rang so hard that he could _hear_ it, a harsh clamor like he'd been recast as a bell clapper.

And then, suddenly, when it was becoming nigh unbearable, it stopped but for the faintest buzz across his nerves, leaving him panting and sweating as hard as any fit had ever taken him. Definitely time for a drink, he thought, licking bone-dry lips and bracing himself carefully on the ground lest it rise up and strike him. He was parched; if the Seine were wine he could swallow it whole, ten kraters at a time -

"So you're awake at last."

Grantaire looked up at a man he'd never seen before. "Sorry?"

"It took you a while," he said, and threw a long, shabby greatcoat at him.

When Grantaire, surprised, didn't dodge, it landed on his head; something metallic followed, clattering to the stones before him. He pulled the moth-eaten wool from his head. Light gleamed off the hilt of a cavalry saber; he looked at it uncomprehendingly, then looked up at the man again.

"Well, go on," he said. "Put them on."

 

They were dead.

They were all dead - _Enjolras_ was dead, they had left him alone in a darkened world; they had gone to the darkened world and left him drowning in the river without a boatman; he had died with them and could never join them in death as he had never truly joined them in life.

That was the gist of it, or so he thought. It was hard to think; he had not been sober for so many hours running in he could not remember how long, but it was undeniable that he was alive - he bled, he hurt, he healed - and Enjolras was dead. He had seen Apollo's body; he had seen all their bodies, lined out like fish and loaves. Joly was dead. He had had a cold that morning at breakfast that no herb had helped, but some sage did grow against the power of death because Grantaire, Grantaire was not dead, and could not die.

"Here," Matthieu said, and handed him a bottle.

Grantaire took it without a word and drank.

 

* * *

 

The boy was a talkative drunk. That was probably the understatement of this lifetime, he thought. He had spent the last few hours in the same blank silent denial that Methos had seen a hundred, a thousand times over; he'd considered telling him he actually didn't have it so bad, that a quick, clean cut from your past life was for the best, that watching the sun grow old and fade away was far worse than a sudden eclipse - but he also had seen a hundred times that no words would help.

So he'd pulled him across the city, into a wineshop far from the one he'd died in, and they'd begun to drink. Two bottles had vanished in a blink; halfway into the third one, Grantaire had started to talk, a rambling, desperate stream of consciousness peppered with allusion; a river that showed no signs of slowing or ceasing as they proceeded into the fifth and then the sixth, even as his voice mellowed at last, trading a harsh burr for a gentle slur. Methos topped up his glass as soon as it emptied, though he went at his own more slowly. Paris was not exactly over-popular with Immortals since Robespierre and his Madame had come to visit a few revolutions past, but there were always some brave romantics who couldn't let go - and those with pressing business.

His own had been just concluded when he'd felt the pre-Immortal buzz that had dogged him falter and vanish; this bit with the boy had not been strictly necessary, but after all, it hadn't taken much in the midst of chaos to get the corpse out of sight and pick the remaining lead shot out of it. He'd been paid back that much effort already by the impressive speech he was being treated to; the last time he'd had a drinking partner so willing and able to carry the whole conversation himself, he'd _been_ in Rome.

Grantaire paused in his talk to drink. His hand was trembling slightly.

"We should go," Methos said, before he could start again.

"What?"

They were alone in the shop; even the proprietor had retreated under the unending assault of words, leaving them a few more bottles which Methos had agreed to pay for in advance. "After a public death like that, you'll want to move on," he said.

"Death," Grantaire said, coughed once or twice, and reached for the open bottle with the careful precision of a long-practiced drunk. He drank from it and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. "I wouldn't be caught dead in Paris. Couldn't be. To stand the test of Parisiens like Jesus and the Pharisiens - God, Matthieu - I thought God was poor, but a poor man accepts even a dirty sou when it's offered freely."

He drank deeply, draining the bottle and wavering gently as he leaned back in his chair. Methos considered handing him another, but it seemed likely to be enough to put him under the table instead of on top of it.

"Move on," he said finally, slumping back down, his head drooping despite the brace of his elbows. "To drop a life as easily as dropping a name and start a world by ending another. Is that what you do, Matthieu? Is that what we are good for?"

"If you can't die," Methos said, taking the emptied bottle from Grantaire's slackening grip, "then you might as well live by whatever means you can."

 

They set out for Calais the next day; Methos - and Matthieu - had had enough of France for a lifetime and by necessity so had Grantaire. A short stop in Dover to finish his business and change his name seemed as good a choice as any; then it would be time to get thoroughly lost for another few lifetimes. Byron had been, if irresistible, altogether too obvious.

Grantaire came along in the manner of a lost dog and Methos let him. He'd had a letter from an old friend not so many years ago; he'd see if Jack was still about and interested. Grantaire might have been good company, but Methos did not particularly want another student so soon; that sort of thing became a habit... one that never led anywhere good.

 

* * *

 

Behind a bar was as good a place as any to be when you felt two other Immortals coming at the same time, so Jack didn't bother to move. Besides: it was pissing with rain out and inside he had his sword, his pistols, his rum and his ship - it would take a special kind of idiot to leave that for a challenge. Not that he held much with challenges when it wasn't.

But when the door swung open, both men came in at once, without any funny business; the taller took off his drenched hat and looked up and across the empty bar. Jack grinned. "Benjamin," he said, and reached under the bar, pulling out a bottle of the best. "Thought my letter'd passed you in the post, mate."

"Yes, well," he said, "it did once or twice, seeing as it's Matthew - for the moment."

"Right, right," Jack said, waving it off. Secrecy and all that. He wouldn't say it was overrated - no, he understood the value of a good secret as much as anyone - but Benjamin - Matthew, was it? had always been a bit too keen. "Come on and have a drink, since you got here anyway."

Matthew's friend perked up a bit at that, taking off his own hat and shaking the water off. He looked young, and not just in the face; he was awkward, moving like the sword under that coat wasn't quite part of him yet.

Jack managed two glasses that looked like they'd been clean somewhat recently and splashed them full, shoving one to each as they came up to the bar, then taking a swig from the bottle. The boy slammed his back in one gulp, his dark eyes widening with the burn, and Jack refilled his glass. "Who's this, then?" he asked.

"Grantaire," the boy said, finishing the second shot as quick as water. "For the moment," he added, holding out the glass again. His accent was awful, but the poke, such as it was, made Matthew roll his eyes, so Jack forgave it.

"Nice name for a new duckling," he said. He poured again, then slanted a look over at Matthew, whose glass was barely touched. "Changed your mind about signing on with me and the Pearl, have you?"

Matthew shuddered dramatically. Quite memorable, really, Jack thought, making note of it for possible future applications. "No," he said. "No ships for me. But if you're in need of a hand..." His eyes flicked to Grantaire significantly.

Resting his elbow on the bar, Jack leaned back and took a good look. He didn't look like much, but that drinking was impressive; besides, there was a few years' worth of drink left in the back before it was time to roust up another crew and make a new name for himself. "It's possible," he allowed. "As a favor to you, love."

"I get no say?" Grantaire asked.

Jack blinked. "Do you want one?"

He opened his mouth, then paused, glanced between them, and shrugged. "I want a drink."

Obligingly, Jack passed him the bottle; he drank straight from it, let out a sigh, drank again.

"Look at more of the world before you decide there's nothing left in it," Matthew told him, then shook the rest of the rain from his hat, set his rum on the bar, clapped Grantaire on the shoulder and turned to go.

"Send me your name when you pick it, savvy?" Jack called after him; the door shut without an answer. "That's like him," he added, finding another bottle; between them, the first one didn't seem likely to last. "Always running off like that. Good survival skill, though."

"Surviving from a prophet to a sailor," Grantaire said, having finished Matthew's glass and gone back to nursing at the first bottle, "singing of arms and the man exiled by destiny. But Apollo is gone, and the guide, and Venus will have nothing to do with me, and I have a sword but no fate--"

"Just as well, really," said Jack, and fumbled in his pocket for his compass, flipping it open. For him, as always when he took to land to wait out another set of new faces, it pointed to the Pearl in her bottle on the shelves behind him. "Try this, if you're looking for a guide," he said, offering it. "Can't help you with the fate bit."

Grantaire took it; the needle spun.


End file.
